Gulu youth refuse to refund Shs1.3b to govt
Left to right (front row): Minister for Northern Uganda Reconstruction Kenneth Omona, Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja, and Government Chief Whip Denis Obua, at a function in Gulu District on May 31. Gulu City Council administration says they cannot recover more than Shs1.3 billion from youth and women projects. PHOTO | FILE
What you need to know:
- The leaders say policy gaps in the programme’s implementation have failed their efforts in recovering funds.
Gulu City Council administration has said they cannot recover more than Shs1.33 billion, which was disbursed to the youth and women under the Youth Livelihood Fund (YLP) and the Uganda Women Entrepreneurship Programme (UWEP).
The council’s December 2023 financial statements indicates that unrecovered funds had accumulated up to Shs1.79 billion, including advanced payments to the youth and women groups and accrued revenue.
According to the Auditor General’s report, upon assessing the projects’ progress, there was less effort in enforcing YLP and UWEP funds recoveries.
“There is a risk that these funds could become uncollectible, leading to a financial loss to the government and the entity,’’ says the report.
“Receivables represent an idle asset that denies the council the opportunities to utilise the funds to implement planned activities,” the report adds.
The report further recommended that the accounting officer should design strategies to ensure the recovery of funds.
Mr Innocent Ahimbisibwe, the city’s town clerk, told this newspaper that they have lost hope in recovering the funds.
“Some of the funds under YLP are not recoverable for the reason that the groups have disintegrated and we cannot find them. Some of them [youth and women] have migrated and gone to South Sudan, Qatar, Dubai, and other regions outside the country,” he says.
“Even if we were to design strategies, I don’t see how we are going to find the defaulters. Some have got married; they have switched to other regions after they picked money from a group here in Gulu City,’’ he adds.
On Friday, the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee-Local Government, while querying the city’s technical officials, squeezed the city’s Labour and Gender officer, Mr Geoffrey Lakwonyero, to explain why they have failed to recover the funds.
The committee chaired by Kilak MP, Mr Gilbert Olanya, tasked Mr Lakwonyero to explain why more than Shs1.3 billion out of the total Shs1.7 billion disbursement had not been discovered.
“Tell us why you have not been able to recover the funds. We still have up to Shs1.3 billion with the youth and the women, are you confident that we can recover this money?” Mr Olanya asked.
Whereas Mr Lakwonyero expressed optimism about recovering the funds, he told the committee that policy gaps in the programme’s implementation guidelines have failed their efforts.
“The lack of policies and proper guidelines around these two programmes is where our gaps are; no specific guidelines are providing for the arrests of these youth,” he said.
“There was a time we tried to enforce the arrests to recovery together with the RDC’s office; instead, the youth ganged up and sued us in court,’’ Mr Lakwonyero added.
In the last disbursement, women groups under the UWEP received a total of Shs350 million, while the youth took more than Shs580 million.
“We gave demand notices to each of the groups with outstanding balances, and we were able to recover Shs58m that we transferred to the Bank of Uganda. We also recovered Shs20 million under YLP that we also transferred in the past year,” Mr Lakwonyero says.
Ms Christine Olok, the city’s deputy mayor, said: “The YLP and UWEP are good initiatives. But we need to sensitise our people on the use of these funds.”
About YLP
YLP is a government multi-billion-dollar intervention that targets the poor and unemployed youth. The programme was rolled out in 2014/2015 as a revolving fund.
